On July 9, 1866, Captains Hudson and Fitch with their dog, Fanny, sailed from New York in  a three masted full-rigged 26 foot long boat named “Red, White, and Blue.” They arrived in Margate in in East Kent, UK on August 16th.  While the rigging was conventional, if diminutive,  “Red, White, and Blue’s” hull was a galvanized metal lifeboat. The trip was intended to publicize a new metal lifeboat design by New York boat builder, O.K. Ingersoll.  The words “Ingersoll’s Improved Metallic Life Boat” were written on both sides of the hull.

The problem with the marketing plan was that when the square-rigged lifeboat arrived in England, no one believed that two men and a dog had sailed the small craft across the Atlantic in slightly more than a month.  Unfortunately, the two captains had no way to prove that they had indeed sailed “Red, White, and Blue” across the ocean and were never taken seriously. Years later, scholars reviewed the logs, the weather and sightings, and concluded that the two captains and their dog did indeed complete their voyage as claimed.  Even if Captains Hudson and Fitch and Fanny were never given credit in their day for their remarkable voyage, the “Red, White, and Blue” was captured for posterity in a Currier and Ives print now in the collection at Springfield Museums.  Thanks to Harry Milkman for passing the story along.

THE MINIATURE SHIP “RED, WHITE, AND BLUE.”